Minnesota Prairie Roots

Writing and photography by Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Trying tofu at a soup party September 30, 2011

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Guests gather inside and outside a Waseca garage for an autumn soup party.

IT IS, FOR MY EXTENDED FAMILY, a rite of autumn in Minnesota.

The orange tub of cheese balls. My nieces’ bloody finger cookies. Julie’s homemade breads, still warm from the oven. Vintage trays stacked high. Crockpots, brimming with soup, crammed onto tables inside the garage. Sampling each soup or chili. And afterward, conversation and laughter around the backyard campfire.

Last Saturday night my sister Lanae and her husband Dale hosted their eighth annual soup party at their Waseca home for family and friends. For me, and many others, it’s a must-attend autumn event.

Tortellini with Italian Sausage Soup, left, and German Potato Salad and Creamy Corn with Jalapeno soups to the right in photo.

Homemade breads, this year crafted by Lanae and Dale's friends, Julie and Vicki.

Bloody finger cookies, a soup party tradition.

Sweatshirt weather on a day that transitions quickly from cool to cooler. Oranges and reds and yellows. Chili that bites and heats the innards. Comfort in the familiarity of Chicken Noodle Soup laced with thick, homemade noodles. Unfamiliarity in the Chinese Hot & Sour Soup among these mostly Germans more connected to the German Potato Salad Soup.

Trying tofu for the first time in that tasty Chinese soup.

Listening to my other sister share how her family detests the stench of the Broccoli Cheese Soup she brings every year.

Trading left-overs with Carol, who raves about my Black Bean Pumpkin Soup, which I don’t find all that great. I think I’m the winner, getting her Chicken Noodle Soup. Carols thinks she’s gotten the better end of the swap. It is a matter of opinion, a matter of taste preferences.

Crocks of soups and chilis are set up on tables inside the garage.

Vintage metal trays provide the perfect place to set bowls of soup/chili and other food.

Before the party, guests tell my sister what soup/chili they are bringing so she has labels ready to mark each soup on party night.

We don’t arrive expecting to like all of the soups and chilis—15 this year:

  • Chinese Hot & Sour
  • Reuben Chowder
  • Broccoli Cheese
  • Gunflint Chili
  • White Chili
  • Chocolate (yes, soup)
  • Lemon Orzo
  • Tortellini with Italian Sausage
  • German Potato Salad (yes, soup)
  • Ham & Bean
  • Creamy Corn with Jalapeno,
  • Pumpkin Black Bean
  • Stuffed Sweet Pepper
  • Chicken Noodle
  • Red Chili

But we arrive expecting to enjoy ourselves in the company of family and friends on a beautiful autumn evening in Minnesota. And we do. And I did.

Soups/chilis are uncovered and party-goers start lining up to sample the offerings.

THANKS, LANAE AND DALE, for hosting this fun, tasty event.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

The final harvest September 28, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:55 AM
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DEEP IN THE RICH FARMLAND of southwestern Minnesota, a group of farmers are planning for harvest. But not their harvest.

They will gather to bring in the crops of their friend and neighbor, Steve, who was found dead at the scene of a single-vehicle crash eight days ago. Even before last Friday’s funeral, these good people had lined up half a dozen combines to sweep across Steve’s corn and soybean fields south of Lucan.

One day for the corn. One day for the beans.

I don’t know the identities of these friends. But I expect they were among the mourners who packed St. John’s Lutheran Church in Redwood Falls on Friday to console a grieving family, to find comfort in Scripture and song and words spoken.

I was there. We heard the pastor tell us how God loved Steve so much that he called him home—too early in our eyes, at the age of 64—to spare him from evil and to give him peace.

Words that helped us to understand, from a pastor who considered Steve a personal friend, who himself paused to wipe tears from his eyes during his message.

As I sat in the balcony, looking down toward the casket, to the family in the front rows, my heart broke. For my youngest brother who had stretched his arms along the back of the pew to encircle his wife and their teenaged daughter and their son. They had lost their father, father-in-law and grandpa.

And later, at the cemetery, as my dear sister-in-law leaned forward in her chair, her head bent, her hands clasped tight in her lap, my heart broke.

Minutes later I pulled my 11-year-old nephew close as tears slid down his cheeks, as his body shook with sobs of grief. I wrapped him in my arms, stroked the back of his head, wished with all my might that I could make everything better for the boy who loved his “Papa” so much.

Later, in the church basement, we found moments of laughter in the stories shared by Steve’s oldest son about the perfectionist farmer who each morning walked out of his farmhouse and checked to see that everything was in its place in the farmyard.

We laughed at the man who spent one final weekend with his family, arriving at a downtown Minneapolis hotel with a small bag, asking to, once again, borrow his other son’s shaver.

It felt good to laugh through the tears, to hear about the grandfather who kept cats because he knew his grandchildren loved them, who got a lamb because he knew his grandchildren would love that lamb.

We laughed and remembered and celebrated the life of a man who was dear to so many.

When Steve’s farmer-friends roll their combines onto his acreage, they’ll pay him one last tribute—by bringing in the final harvest.

“To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted…”

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NOTE: The above combine photo is for illustration purposes only and was shot just outside of Courtland on Saturday morning.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Grieving September 22, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 10:19 PM
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“THANK GOD FOR MY FAITH,” my mom said as she shared yet another piece of tragic news that has touched my extended family this week.

Her dear cousin Alice, 79, died Tuesday as a result of injuries sustained in a car accident in North Mankato. This I learned in a phone call on Wednesday. After I hung up, and per my mom’s request, I began phoning four of my five siblings.

A day earlier I had done the same.

My sister-in-law’s 64-year-old father was found dead at the scene of a single-vehicle accident in Cottonwood County early Tuesday morning, news I was asked to share with other family members.

This is almost more than we, my extended family, can bear right now. We’ve leaned on and supported each other and relied on our strong faith in God and on friends to get us through our hours and days.

Yet, I know the most difficult minutes are yet to come—when I see my brother and his wife and their two children. What will I say that will console them? Words and hugs seem inadequate. Prayers are not.

My mom is right. It is faith in God that sustains us. We are not alone.

And, certainly, we are not the only family grieving. In Waseca, many are mourning the loss of 11-year-old Jaiden, a sixth-grader who on Monday committed suicide. My sister, a Waseca floral designer, has been creating floral arrangements for Jaiden’s funeral. My two young nieces, who attend school in Waseca, and my other sister, who teaches in Waseca, have all been impacted by Jaiden’s death.

Grief runs deep.

In Faribault, family and friends are mourning the death of 25-year-old Wendi due to injuries sustained in a motor vehicle accident. She was a Faribault High School classmate of my eldest; my daughter did not know her well.

Grief runs deep.

We all know we are going to die. Yet, when a death comes unexpectedly, in a tragic way, it’s especially difficult to comprehend, to accept, to understand.

We do the best we can. We cry and pray and talk and, for me, write.

And last night I laughed, a laugh that built and rolled into a deep belly laugh that left my muscles aching. When I think about it now, the subject of my laughter wasn’t at all funny—as my husband told me at the time. But I asked him, “Would you rather I cry?”

So I laughed. Because I’ve already cried too much.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Hurting hearts in need of prayer September 21, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:30 AM
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WHAT DO YOU SAY? What do you say? What do you say to your sister-in-law who has just learned that her father has died in a single-vehicle accident in southwestern Minnesota?

What do you say when your heart hurts, when all you can do is cry and you need to console someone who is hurting more than you?

What do you say?

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry… I love you.”

As your voice breaks and the tears fall and there is silence on the other end of the phone line, you pull yourself together. Not because you can, but because you must. You want your sister-in-law to hear you speak, to feel your love embracing her, in your words, on the worst day of her life.

This was my Tuesday.

First came the phone call early Tuesday morning from my other sister-in-law with the news which sent me reeling, my heart racing, the tears flowing in a river of grief.

“… dad was killed in a car accident last night…”

Sketchy details that don’t matter because they won’t bring him back—the husband, the father, the grandfather, the brother, the uncle, the man loved by so many.

It is my duty to inform three of my younger siblings, my mom… What do I say? How can I tell them?

So I phone my husband first, barely able to still my trembling fingers to punch the numbers into my cell phone. I can hardly get the words out, to tell him the awful, awful news. He offers to call my family. But I tell him, “No, I can do this.”

And I do. First my brother, who is on vacation and whom I am unable to reach. In my voice message I instruct him to call me, that it is important.

Then I speak to my sister, who will contact my other sister.

I call my eldest daughter, leave a message with the other daughter. My son will get the news when he arrives home from school.

And then I must tell my mom. But I don’t want her to be alone, so I call my aunt—her neighbor—to deliver the news in person. I phone my mom 10 minutes later, after my aunt has arrived, and my grief breaks through again in words overwhelmed with emotion.

Later my aunt phones to tell me we reached my mom just in time, before a friend called with the news of Steve’s death. In a small town, word travels quickly.

And so my Tuesday ebbed and flowed with grief in more than a dozen phone calls made and fielded. The message left with my youngest brother, mourning the tragic death of his father-in-law. The husband and father trying to be strong for his wife and their children.

I cry for my young nephew and my teenage niece and their mom and her mom and my youngest brother. All of them. A family hurting.

And then when I can calm myself, if but for a moment, I bow my head in prayer, asking for God’s comfort and peace to bless this grieving family.

It is all my sister-in-law has asked of me—to pray.

And now I am asking you. Please pray.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Harvest barn dance celebrates family, friends and yesteryear September 19, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 6:45 AM
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A father and son were among the hundreds of guests attending a dance in this 96-year-old barn.

IN THE 1930s, at the height of The Great Depression, a young Herb Becker attended dances in the sprawling red barn along Rice County Road 1 several miles west of Dundas.

Herb didn’t know it then, but in 1948 he and his wife Dorothy would buy the “Faber farm” site with the 36-foot by 100-foot barn.

Today his youngest son John and wife Debbie own the farm, purchased in 1988. Saturday they hosted their first-ever Harvest Time Barn Dance.

John and Debbie Becker have reshingled and done other work to their barn to keep it from deteriorating.

“It’s a dream come true,” John said several times through-out the event which brought the barn back full circle to his father Herb—who died in 2009—and those long-ago barn dances.

I bet Herb would have been pleased with the party that drew family, friends and neighbors of the Beckers together on a cool autumn evening to visit, eat and dance the night away in the old hay mow. My husband Randy and I were among our friends’ invited guests.

Everything about the celebration in this 1915 barn spoke to the kind of down-home neighborliness and love of family that define the Beckers and the Malechas (Debbie’s family). These are good, honest, hard-working people of faith with their roots planted deep in the earth. I doubt I stopped smiling all evening.

And there was plenty to smile about—from the country-style decorated barn complete with red-and-white checked tablecloths, zinnias/sedum/golden rod in fruit jars, pitchforks, bushel baskets, seed corn signage, wooden barrels, cream separator, horse harness and lots more to the kids and adults sporting cowboy hats, cowboy boots and other western attire to the welcoming, sometimes boot-stomping, music of The Revivals band.

Battery-operated tea light candles and flowers in quart jars decorated tables covered with red and/or red-and-white checked cloths. This photo looks toward the west end of the hay mow.

Everywhere collectibles and antiques were on display, creating a setting of simple country charm.

Guests indulged in tasty roast beef sandwiches, calico beans, an array of salads and bars.

The Beckers created a coffee corner, where guests could grab some "De-Calf" or "Real Calf," visit, maybe even pull a deck of cards from the shelf for a game of Euchre.

Fall and vintage decorations lined the pathway leading into the barn.

It was the type of evening reminiscent of the old-fashioned gatherings of yesteryear, when adults could visit while the kids played with carefree abandon. And they did on Saturday. Tag and hide-and-seek. Pick-up football in the dusty farm yard. Make-believe, chasing each other with cap guns blazing.

Kids ran and played and ran and played--all night.

Heading out the barn door...

The kids, and a few adults, brought cap guns.

Probably my favorite image of the evening...no words necessary to describe these happy boys.

Inside, the adults admired the architectural bones of the barn, cranking necks upward toward the skeletal rafters, toward the conveyor that once carried hay bales across this dairy barn hay mow. And before that, the hay fork, on display outside the barn. They imagined climbing the ladder on the east end of the barn, like daring trapeze artists, to a platform above.

Looking toward the east end of the hay mow.

The east end of the hay mow with the ladder and platform and highlighting the barn's framework.

Looking toward the west end of the hay barn.

Pulling popcorn duty at the barn dance.

And later, when The Revivals from New Prague rocked the rafters with music that spanned polkas and waltzes to country and 1950s-1970s hits, adults and kids alike slid their feet across the corn meal-slicked plywood covering the maple floor that was too unsalvageable for refinishing. They twirled and shook and twisted.

And they danced like Herb would have wanted them to dance, celebrating life.

The Revivals from New Prague played a mix of music from old-time to rock.

Leaving the barn dance. Vehicles packed the farm yard.

CHECK BACK FOR MORE barn dance images. I won’t have photos of the dancing; once I had my band shot, I put away the camera.

HAVE YOU EVER attended a barn dance? If you haven’t, you might want to become friends with the Beckers. I bet they’ll have plenty of requests for a repeat harvest dance next fall. Thanks, John and Debbie, for an absolutely memorable and fun evening.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Would you buy a Vanuck or…? September 15, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:36 AM
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TYPICALLY, MY HUSBAND and I don’t meddle in our two adult daughters’ lives. We don’t intrude or hover like helicopter parents. Advice is given only when sought. We’ve learned it works best that way.

But when it comes to cars, well, that’s entirely different. I can’t even count how often the phone has rung with one daughter or the other on the line saying:

  • “My car is making a funny noise.”
  • “My car won’t start.”
  • “I have a flat tire.”
  • “I need my oil changed.”

And so their dad, an automotive machinist, steps in to help whenever he can, in person or with advice over the phone. He has the knowledge and the skills to problem-solve nearly any mechanical issue.

Yet, though, because of distance—our second daughter now lives in eastern Wisconsin—or circumstances (like a broken down car parked at a St. Paul gas station), he can’t always assist. He’ll offer his suggestions and the daughters have to take it from there.

Recently our 25-year-old daughter, the one who lives in Minneapolis, decided she wants to purchase a different car to replace her 1995 Geo Prizm. She’s driven her Geo since high school and it’s starting to show its age.

While she’s been researching cars online, we did a little car shopping of our own for her when we were back in my hometown of Vesta recently. We found three possible vehicle replacements. Here they are in no particular order, with as much information as was available about each.

CHOICE A:

Chevy Cobalt

A 2002 – 2006 (the automotive machinist was uncertain) Chevy Cobalt. Clean interior.

CHOICE B:

2008 Ford Focus

A 2008 Ford Focus one-owner, never-smoked-in (yeah, important point), with new tires (plus), clean interior (bonus), 34 – 40 mpg (yahoo), and only 57,000 miles (nice number). However, the car was priced at $12,000, about double our daughter’s budgeted amount.

CHOICE C:

The "Vanuck," which did not have a "for sale" sign posted on it, but sat in the Dave's Auto Used Cars lot.

A truly one-of-a-kind Ford vehicle that cannot be defined, so let’s call it a Vanuck. Front features a roomy 11 – 12-passenger van (great for transporting our daughter’s many friends). Back features a spacious storage area for bikes, tents, groceries, whatever (bonus). Appears well-constructed with a strong weld and new under-body framework (good safety features). However, back door of van section cannot be opened (negative for passenger safety in event of an emergency). Mileage uncertain, but probably low (two thumbs down). Not likely to be stolen (two thumbs up). Size may make it difficult to maneuver (ahem, back up) or navigate through metro traffic.

SO, WHICH OF THE ABOVE should we recommend to our daughter? Or should she/we keep shopping? Submit a comment. I’d like your helpful input.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Remembering: Boys, blocks & 9/11 September 9, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 6:09 AM
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THROUGHOUT THIS WEEK I’ve contemplated the post I would write about 9/11. And not once have I deviated from my initial idea.

So yesterday I headed to the basement and started digging through totes in search of building blocks and toy airplanes. I found the blocks, but not the planes. Those I discovered later while rummaging through my son’s upstairs bedroom closet.

Ten years ago, on September 11, 2001, my boy was only seven years old. He was home from school that day, not feeling well, when my husband phoned with news of the first plane crashing into the first tower.

I switched on the television. Typically I don’t have the TV on during the day and would not have known about the terrorist attacks until much later.

From that moment on, I could not take my eyes off the screen even though I worried about exposing my son and a younger boy in my care that day to the news coverage. How would they react? And did they truly understand the gravity of what was unfolding in our country?

I attempted to explain the situation, to tell the boys this was “real” and not some television show. They continued playing with whatever toys they had out at the time—I can’t recall.

But clearly they were listening and watching, for soon the two pulled a box of wooden building blocks from the toy box. Then they pulled out the toy airplanes.

I watched as my 7-year-old and his friend constructed teetering towers, then smashed those miniature planes into the towers. Blocks tumbled across the living room carpet.

I reconstructed a tower using the same blocks my son and his friend used on September 11, 2001, to duplicate what they saw on television. These are also the same airplanes they flew into the towers.

They repeated the action: Build the towers. Fly the planes. Smash the towers. Build. Fly. Smash.

I could have cried over the loss of innocence—mine and theirs.

WHAT ARE YOUR PERSONAL memories of September 11, 2001? Please submit a comment and share your story.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

No first day of school tears here September 6, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 8:35 AM
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My oldest daughter and my son in a photo taken in May.

MY YOUNGEST STARTED his first day of his final year of high school this morning.

I feel as if I should be crying or something. But I’m not.

By now, by the third child, after 20 years of first days of school, it’s not such a big deal any more. The excitement and the anticipation just aren’t there.

It’s not that I’m a negligent mom who doesn’t care about her child or her child’s education. Rather, the first day of school novelty wore off long ago.

Last night in our house, there was no last-minute packing of the backpack, no pre-school-day jitters. Rather my concern leaned more toward making sure the 17-year-old got to sleep at a reasonable hour.

He is a night owl. If my teen had his way, classes would start around 11 a.m. So today, really, begins the battle of trying to get him to get enough sleep. This issue causes much strife in our household. Next year, at college, he’s on his own.

My focus right now is directed in guiding my son toward selecting a college. He has the smarts—an ACT test score of 32 and nearly a 4.0 GPA—to get in anywhere. But he certainly doesn’t have the money. However, I’ve encouraged him to apply wherever he wishes because maybe, just maybe, he’ll get a financial aid package that will allow him to afford a school he couldn’t otherwise afford.

I’ve suggested he make two college lists: a dream list and a realistic list.

In the meantime, during the first semester of his senior year of high school, my boy is enrolled in a rigorous course of study: Introduction to Economics, Advanced Placement Calculus, Advanced Chemistry and CIS Anatomy/Physiology. He’s also taking speech and logic at the local community technical college. By graduation in June, my son should have more than a semester of college credits earned.

I’ve encouraged him to pursue these college credits. They’re free, I keep telling him. Why wouldn’t you? He understands.

And so these are my thoughts this morning as my last child, who is eight years younger than his oldest sister and six years younger than his other sister, begins his senior year of high school.

No tears shed in this household. But next year at this time, when my husband and I are dropping our youngest off at his dorm, or seeing him off at the airport—if he manages to get into a college on his dream list—I expect the tears will fall fast and steady.

IF YOU’RE A PARENT with school-age children, how did the first day of school go for you? Share your thoughts and/or experiences in a comment.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

Buffalo plaid and barn swallows at an elegant wedding reception August 16, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 7:31 AM
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Lindsey and Brent were married at St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Wyoming. See my educational note at the end of this photo regarding seating during a wedding ceremony.

LONG GONE ARE THE DAYS of crepe paper streamers, tissue paper wedding bells and bud vases of carnations decorating tables at wedding receptions. That would have been my reception in the Vesta Community Hall 29 years ago.

Now when I consider that décor, I practically slink onto the floor in embarrassment. But it was what it was and no one expected more in 1982. We had a good time celebrating and that’s what counted.

Today it’s all about elegance and this and that and even hiring a wedding planner to coordinate the big event, because, truly, weddings have become events as much as celebrations.

On Friday my niece Lindsey married Brent in Wyoming, Minnesota, with the reception following at the Majestic Oaks Golf Club in Ham Lake. Now if you want to picture the polar opposite of my small-town community hall reception with the meal catered by an area grocery store and served on, gasp, Styrofoam plates with plastic ware, then Lindsey and Brent’s reception would be it.

Lindsey and Brent's reception was held in an elegant banquet room at Majestic Oaks.

The name Majestic Oaks suits the elegant banquet room décor. I felt rather like royalty dining at a round table swathed in a white tablecloth and set with hefty silverware—including three forks—under airy chandeliers and mini-white lights wrapped in gauzy fabric.

I didn’t need to fret about where to sit as tables were assigned. My husband and I were seated at table 13, which didn’t prove at all unlucky.

At this reception, guests didn’t form a buffet line; we were served at our tables. When I saw my nephew eating a flower—which I initially thought was a radish—from his dinner plate, I gasped.

My meal of chicken, green beans, potatoes and, yes, that edible orchid.

“You can eat orchids,” my sister-in-law informed me (she should know; she works in food service) and I replied with something like “I’ll wait 20 minutes to see if Jeremy’s OK before eating mine.” I didn’t and I did—eat that orchid. Tasteless. I prefer my orchid in a vase, although eating one certainly presented a moment of Fear Factor entertainment.

The bridal party’s entry into the banquet hall also proved entertaining as the attendants tried to outdo each other with dance moves. I had to ask my 25-year-old daughter why the maid of honor, my niece Katie, was wearing a buffalo paid shirt upon her entrance.

“Because she walked into the reception to the song ‘Minnesota Gurls’,” Amber told me.

The maid of honor and best man entered the reception hall wearing plaid shirts in the spirit of true Minnesotans.

Oh, yeah, sure, ya betcha, I thought, like I’ve ever heard of that spoof on Katy Perry’s “California Girls.” But I appreciated the nod to Paul Bunyan and Bemidji, where the bride’s parents attended college and where you’ll find Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox statues.

The bride skipped the plaid when she walked into the banquet room.

All in all, I’d rate the reception venue as fancy schmancy based on my experiences as a wedding guest. Yet, one moment stood out as downplaying the elegance aspect just a bit. That would be the barn swallows nesting in their mud nests right above the balcony doorway. One wedding guest suffered the misfortune of being pooped upon.

A discussion ensued between my husband and me as to how the bird crap problem (both upon the guest and on the balcony carpet) could best be addressed. He suggested blasting the pests with a high pressure water hose, but then noted that swallows are a protected bird. I didn’t believe him, but he is right.

IN SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION, my niece’s wedding proved educational as follows:

  • Barn swallows are a protected species and will poop on you whether they are in a Redwood County barn or outside a fancy Ham Lake banquet room.
  • Orchids are edible.
  • California girls are not the only ones with a song devoted to them.
  • Do not sit behind the tallest member of your extended family during a wedding ceremony.
  • Always do a last-minute check on directions to your hotel because road construction may have occurred between the time the invitations were mailed and the wedding date. Do not assume that, when you spot your brother’s law office across the street from the gas station (where you are asking for directions to the hotel) at midnight that you can break into the law office and spend the night there because you can’t figure out where the heck the hotel is located and neither can the convenience store clerk because the hotel name constantly changes.
  • Brides should not crash other bride’s parties. Show up twice and security, aka the bartender, will be alerted. My question to the party-crashing bride: Was Lindsey and Brent’s party more fun than yours or were you too inebriated to realize that you were in the wrong banquet hall?
  • Finally, young men who enter the women’s bathroom looking for a woman named Rosa will be stopped. By me.

HERE ARE SOME OTHER favorite wedding shots:

Maid of honor Katie tucked her iPod into the sash of her bridesmaid's dress.

My sister-in-law Rosie, the bride's mom, gave out last-minute instructions before the ceremony. She appeared calm to me. Now whether she really was that calm, I don't know.

I love this sweet shot that shows my niece Jocelyn with her daughter Meghan before the wedding service. Meghan, who will be two in October, was the flower girl. She walked down the aisle, oh, yes, she did.

The more I look at this photo, the more I like it. The image of Lindsey and Brent entering the limo reminds me of two celebrities swarmed by fans and the paparazzi.

One of the groomsmen opened his window and I snapped this image.

Photographing guests photographing the bridal party.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

 

From a small Minnesota town: “My dad got shot” August 10, 2011

Filed under: Uncategorized — Audrey Kletscher Helbling @ 12:13 PM
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WEEKS LATER, I STILL can’t shake her haunting words. “My dad got shot,” the darling pixie of a 6-year-old with brown eyes and long, spaghetti-straight auburn hair tells me.

I don’t want to believe her and even question the truthfulness of her statement.

But she is too quick to respond, to say that her dad, Bill, is dead, “buried in the ground.” The father who stole a car and went to jail was shot by someone who came to the house when she was only one, she says. I don’t know if she has her story spot-on correct, but I figure she’s heard it too many times to mess up the truth.

Recently, the police stopped by her house—the one across from the park with the boxspring leaning outside the front door and the stockade of a fence enclosing the back yard. “I don’t know why they came,” she says. I can see the hint of fear in her eyes.

I don’t pry. But I want to swoop her up, hug her, take her away from the bad memories and the stories of the violent death of her father, away from a life that seems not all that stable even now.

Yet, I’ve only met her as my husband and I are in a southern Minnesota small-town city park on a Sunday afternoon. I want to advise her and the boy, who isn’t her brother but lives with her because her mom and his dad “are in love,” that they shouldn’t talk to strangers in the park.

But she has already told me the dead father story and rolled her eyes at the living arrangement between parents. I can’t just tell her and the little boy to go home. Be safe. Don’t talk to strangers or accept food from them. She’s already caused my heart to ache.

So instead, we offer them food. She refuses any. But the boy, about four, gobbles up the potato chips and grapes we give him. It is 1:00 and they have not eaten lunch, although the six-year-old says they ate a late breakfast.

I’m not so sure. Maybe she’s heeding advice she once heard about not accepting food from strangers. Yet, she’s the one who approached Randy when we first arrived, when I was using the porta potty, and told him he looked like her friend Emma’s grandpa.

They seem hungry, not only for food, but for someone who cares.

“I have a dad,” the boy shares between mouthfuls of chips. And that’s when the mite of a girl tells us about her dead father.

Soon the boy’s older sister, by a few years, arrives at the park, apparently sent over to check on the other two.

“Do you want some potato chips?” I ask. She accepts a handful.

“She stole a peach,” the redhead accuses.

“From the grocery store?” I ask, thinking I may now need to teach them right from wrong.

No. The peach was stolen at home.

“I stole pop tarts,” the talkative six-year-old confesses. “She told me to.” She looks directly at the other girl, the one who may someday become her sister if the two in-love parents marry.

I don’t understand her word choice—“stole.”

“We’re supposed to ask (for food),” she explains or “get in trouble.”

Now I am worried. “You don’t get hit for taking food, do you?”

They say “no” and I inwardly breathe a sigh of relief.

Then, after we give cheese slices to the little boy and his sister, with the pixie girl still refusing food, she obeys a summons to come home. The boy is still standing near the picnic table, his sister a short distance away. He struggles to unwrap the single cheese slice.

“Here, let me help you,” I say. He hands me the cheese and I unwrap it. He shoves the slice into his mouth and runs home. His sister declines my offer to remove the cheese wrapping, determined to do it on her own. She does.

I leave the small-town park unsettled and worried about the future of these three children. Already they’ve experienced so much in their young lives: Violent death. Police knocking on the door. Food they feel they must steal.

My heart aches for these children. Will they grow up tough, hardened by the life they’ve already lived? Will they overcome the pain they’ve already experienced? Will they continue to approach strangers in the park…to talk about the dad who was shot, the food they must “steal?”

I wonder. I worry.  Should I have done something more?

THE NAMES IN THIS STORY have been changed to protect these children who thought nothing of walking up to strangers in a park. That also is the reason I am not revealing the Minnesota town where I met them. The rest of the story, sadly, is true.

© Copyright 2011 Audrey Kletscher Helbling